My daughter Charlie is 7 going on 8 very soon and even at a young age she is very set in her ways. She lives by schedule and routine which isn’t a bad thing but at times it does prove to make things difficult. My wife is away on a trip for a family wedding leaving me in charge. Even though Charlie was pretty sad that Mommy was leaving for a week she was also very excited for Daddy/Daughter week to begin. Even though she still has school and dance class all week we’ve managed to have some fun along the way but there have been some difficulties though as a result of her dependence on routine.

The main problem was dance. This is Mommy’s domain. Even though I try to attend every single class and competition I’m pretty much hands off other than helping to motivate and of course drive her to class. So on Monday it came time to put a ballet bun in her hair. First off let me just say that I had no idea there was such a vast amount of different bun styles and types. I thought a bun was a bun and that was it but this isn’t the case.

Of course Mommy was on the ball before leaving. She had me add all of the other dance Mom’s to my contact list and Charlie even chose a back-up Mom to handle all hair duties for the week. I love my wife but she obviously felt that I would fall flat on my face in this department. I could have easily just let the other Mom’s look after this but I felt that a good Daddy would step up to the plate. A good Dad wouldn’t admit defeat. So I decided to give it a try…but there was a process.

Step 1: Ask Charlie what makes a Ballet Bun a Ballet Bun. She gave me a long drawn out answer and of course voiced her opinion that really she appreciated the gesture but she has no confidence that I can pull this off so just let the other Mom’s do it. Thanks Sweet Pea.

Step 2: Cross reference Charlie’s description with YouTube. The internet is a beautiful thing. Watch approximately 40 minutes of bun making videos to find the right one and then watch that 7 minute video a number of times. The great thing is the tutor in the video is probably 9 or 10 and can whip her hair into a ballet bun in about a minute so this means I can easily make a bun in less time than that right?

Step 3: Convince Charlie to sit down and just let Daddy try. She wasn’t on board. But I managed to sway her…she got the hard shell sundae and I got a banana split.

Step 4: After eating our DQ treats I gather the tools. Brush, elastics, funny looking bobby pins (because apparently there are varying styles and types of these things to) and hair spray. I made sure to have two bottles on hand. If I had to I was going to use both bottles. You know…fake it ‘til you make it.

Step 5: Brush Charlie’s hair and continue to convince her that I can do this.

Step 6: Stare at the pony tail that I clearly have down pat and run through what my 10 year old tutor told me to do. Start the process and then convince myself that this was clearly easier for my tutor because her hands were smaller…yup…that’s what it is.

Step 7: Try not to sigh so much. I’m clearly freaking Charlie out at this point. She tried to get up but I had a good grasp of that pony tail at the time. Argue about that for about a minute and listen to her complain about how long it was taking. “It’s because I have big hands now just sit.”

Step 8: Learn the hard way that these bobby pins can actually stab a person. Convince Charlie to stick with me…”Daddy will buy you supper…wherever you want to go.”

Step 9: Fumble and bumble and try and retry. As you go along you actually start to understand the mechanics behind it and suddenly it kind of actually resembles a Ballet Bun….I think?

Step 10: Hold my breath as Charlie checks out the bun in the mirror. On her way there she voices her opinion yet again on how long it took. She gets to the mirror, turns one way, then the next, repeats the process a few times and turns to me with her jaw dropped. I think to myself that this clearly isn’t a good sign. “Daddy! It’s perfect!”

Step 11: Order Pizza and bask in the fact that I completed the task all the while knowing that I will never do it again.